


Evgeni Malkin and the Magic Plumber

by liophael



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Crack, Friendship, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 11:01:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1093112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/liophael/pseuds/liophael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the ringing silence that followed, he and Sidney found themselves staring at each other again.</p><p>"Was not doing that earlier," Geno said.</p><p>"Huh," said Sidney. "Well, I definitely think you need a plumber. At least."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Evgeni Malkin and the Magic Plumber

The week after Geno flew into Pittsburgh from Magnitogorsk was the only time he ever got up consistently with his first alarm. A week of ruthlessly disciplined rising and retiring was the best way to beat jetlag, and over the years he'd learned that cheating didn't work. 

He slung himself gracelessly out of bed and picked his way to the bathroom, feeling like a zombie. He hadn't unpacked properly, preferring just to dig things out of his bags as he needed them. There were clothes and books and DVDs scattered across the floor, as well as the open bags themselves. He was barely awake enough to dodge everything.

When he got to the bathroom - uninjured - he turned the shower on and let it run while he peed. He brushed his teeth as well, because his mouth still tasted like aeroplane and it was disgusting. Warm steam filled the bathroom and he began to feel a little more awake. 

When he was done, spat into the sink and flushed the toilet. Almost at once, the shower stopped. He swore, and tried to convince it to switch on again by pressing all the buttons in every combination he could think of. It didn't work.  

Geno gave it up for a bad job and picked up his soap and shampoo, meaning to go to the guest bedroom across the hall and use the shower there. As he passed the sink, he twisted the tap to rinse away his toothpaste. The tap wasn't working either, even after Geno turned both handles as far as they could go both ways. 

He felt pretty pessimistic walking into the ensuite next door, and, sure enough, the water wasn't working in there either. He went downstairs and performed one final test with the kitchen sink, which turned out to be useless as well.

Geno stood in the middle of his kitchen, still in his shorts, and scrubbed his face hard with his hands. He still wasn't fully awake, and the thing he wanted most in the world was a hot shower. Though his English was getting much better, he didn't feel even close to equal to the task of looking up plumbers in Pittsburgh and then calling one and explaining that all of the plumbing in his house had spontaneously malfunctioned and he was completely without running water. So instead, he trekked back upstairs to get his phone, and texted Sid.

 **(((((( up?**  

Sid was a polite boy who never took long to reply to his texts, so Geno hoped that, if Sid _was_ awake, he wouldn't have long to wait. In the meantime he pulled on some clothes, grabbing the nearest things to hand (which turned out to be a pair of flannel sweats and an Armani logo T-shirt), making a face at how gross he felt.

His phone buzzed right as he finished pulling down his t-shirt.

** yes, what's wrong? **

Geno called him.

"House broken," he said when Sid picked up.

"You got burgled?" Sid exclaimed. "Holy shit. Are you okay?"

"What?" Geno said, frowning and eyeing his phone. 

"Someone broke into your house?" asked Sidney.

"No, no," said Geno. "House is broken. No water. No shower."

"Oh, right," said Sidney, sounding relieved. Geno, unwashed and morose, didn't see anything to be relieved about. 

"Want a shower, Sid," he said, pointedly. 

"Oh, right. You want to come over here?" Sid asked.

"Yes," said Geno, pleased, grabbing a duffel bag and shoving his soap and shampoo into it, followed by a towel and his deodorant, once he'd found it.

"Okay, come round," said Sid. "Are you good to drive?" 

"Pfft," Geno said, flapping the hand that wasn't holding his phone at his curtains dismissively. 

"Seriously," Sid rebuked, "are you awake enough? You want me to pick you up?"

"Fine, Sid," said Geno, rolling his eyes.

"Okay," said Sid. "See you in a bit, then." 

"да," Geno nodded, and hung up. 

He couldn't be bothered finding any socks, so he just slipped barefoot into his shoes and shoved on the first jumper he could find, then threw on his jacket and a beanie, and added some sunglasses for good measure, because the jetlag was making him feel hungover and it seemed appropriate. He looked pretty ridiculous and couldn't have given less of a shit, traipsing out to his car and tossing his bag onto the passenger seat. 

Sidney's new house had finally been completed over the summer, so obviously Geno had never visited it before: but he had received a series of updates on its progress as part of the steady stream of text messages Sid always sent him while he was in Russia. One of them had simply read **my showers work!** , which at this point in time was the information Geno needed.

Although, he soon realised, the exact address might also have been useful. Driving around in his nice, fast car was helping him burn off the moodiness brought on by the bad start to his morning, and he didn't want pull over and call Sid to ask. He knew the new place was near Mario's and he knew where Mario's was, so he decided just to drive there and trawl the nearby streets for a bit, looking for houses that looked new and checking for Sid's car in the driveway. When he got bored, he'd call Sid for directions.  

He found Sidney's house within five minutes. It was extremely close to Mario's - ridiculously close. He sat in his car for a moment, getting his head around how extremely close it really was, and then shook his head, deciding that he wasn't actually that surprised. 

He didn't linger for long though, feeling grottier than ever now that he was so close to finally getting his hot shower, and made his way up to the front door. 

The doorbell was underneath a big hanging storm lamp. He pressed it and tucked his face into his jacket collar to wait. He thought about taking his sunglasses off but decided it was too much effort, and then pressed the bell again, because Sid was taking ages. 

A little more waiting and and some insistent doorbell ringing later, he decided that Sid's house was clearly broken too and got his phone out.

"I'm outside," he said when Sid picked up. 

"Oh, right," said Sid. "Sorry, didn't hear you. Coming down now."

"Be fast," Geno told him. "Faster." 

"I'm coming," Sidney replied, mildly. "Don't rush me." He paused for a second and then, talking mostly to himself, muttered: "oops. Nope. Uh...nope- ah, here we go, two seconds."

Geno pulled his phone away from his ear to stare at it, and then realised what he was hearing.

"You get lost?!" he said, incredulously. 

"No, I just wasn't concentrating," Sid retorted. "You're distracting me."

"Lost!" Geno crowed. "You _shit_ , Sid. _So_  bad."

"I have like no furniture," Sid protested, "all the rooms look the same."

"Can't believe," Geno told him, shaking his head. "You worst, ever." 

The door cracked open and Sid peered round it. 

"I'm gonna bar you," he warned. "Less chirping if you want that shower, eh?" He paused, looking Geno up and down. "Oh my god. What do you look like?!"

He collapsed into laughter, bent double in the doorway. Geno rolled his eyes and barged in, the door sweeping Sid to one side. 

"Move," he said, wrapping a hand round Sidney's wrist and tugging him forward. "Where is shower?"

Sidney was still laughing. 

"Shower," Geno demanded. "Now. Sid. Sid. Sid."

"You look so dumb," Sid wheezed. His laughter lines were so pronounced they nearly closed his eyes, and his huge mouth was spread wide open. It was always strange to Geno how the harder Sidney laughed, the quiter it was. At the moment, it was barely more than air. 

"Sid, feel so gross," he said. "Bad jetlag, bad sleep. Shower please?"

"Yeah, okay," Sid said, composing himself. "Come on, it's this way. You've got to try the one in my bathroom, it's incredible. It's like four or five showers in one. It's awesome." 

*****

Some time later, Geno made his way down to Sidney's kitchen feeling like a new man. He found Sidney there eating a yoghurt and watching television (one of the few peices of furniture he'd seen in the house).

"Hey," said Sid. "Feel better?"

"Yeah," Geno nodded, then added: "starving."

"I've got eggs if you want them?" Sidney said. 

"You make?" Geno asked, hopefully. Sidney eyed him, then sighed and got up. Geno patted him on the head affectionately as he passed, and then stole his spot in front of the television. Sidney had been watching Dragonball Z reruns. 

"Scrambled?" he checked, calling over his shoulder.

He heard Sidney snort. 

"What am I going to do, give you a bunch of boiled eggs on a plate? That's what _you'd_  do." 

Satisfied, Geno turned his attention back to the super saiyans.  

"You want juice?" Sidney asked.

"What kind?" 

"Orange."

"Bits?"

"No," Sidney said, nose wrinkling audibly. "Geez."

"Okay, yes please," Geno said.  

When they were ready, Sidney brought the loaded plate and glass over to Geno, as well as a banana for himself. They sat in front of the TV in easy silence while Geno ploughed through his eggs.  

"So, what happened to your house?" Sidney asked, eventually. "There's something wrong with your water?" 

"I don't know," Geno shrugged. "I try to have shower this morning, it stop working. Taps not working. Nothing working."

"Oh man," said Sidney, sympathetically. "That sounds pretty bad. What're you going to do?"

"Don't know," Geno sighed, folding himself unhappily into the sofa. "I need...man who fixes. Word?" 

"Yeah, a plumber," Sidney nodded. "You got it, or do you want me to call one for you?" 

Geno bent over sideways and gave Sidney a mock-winning smile with his head upside down.

"You?" he begged.

Sidney huffed at him fondly.

"I'll call Gordo," he said, with the air of one invoking a world expert. "He's the guy that did my showers. We should go to your place first though, in case he's got questions. Also, are you going to stay there, or do you want to crash somewhere else for a while? You're welcome here if you want, only I don't have a bed for you."

He pulled a face.

"I wish my furniture was here. I'd have like ten spare beds if it was. Or I guess I you could take mine, and I could sleep at Mario's?" 

Geno hesitated. He really didn't want to stay at his house without running water, and therefore without showers and tea, but he didn't want to kick Sidney out of his own bed either.

"It's no problem, honestly," Sidney told him. "Half of my stuff's still there anyway."

"Sure?" Geno asked.

"Totally sure," Sidney said. "Come on, let's go to your place. You can make up your mind after we've called Gordo and then we can get your stuff if you need it. And you should put on some proper clothes either way." He began laughing again. "You look ridiculous. We should get you a Starbucks and some Ugg boots, complete the look."

Geno wore his sunglasses for the duration of the drive back to his house to make a point. Sidney laughed at him some more, and complained about his car. 

"I mean, _I_  think it's too small," he said, knocking his knee against the dashboard a couple of times and shaking his head.  

"Stop kicking my car," Geno told him. 

"You're car's crowding me," Sidney retorted. "Look out, red light."

Sidney was both the team's least capable navigator and worst backseat driver. Geno had forgotten that over the summer. He rolled his eyes behind his sunglasses. 

Of course, when they hit a roundabout Geno didn't recognise a while later and he actually needed Sidney's input, Sidney was useless.

"Which way?" Geno asked.  

"Here," said Sidney, poiting, and then pulled his finger back. "Wait. No."

"No rush," Geno told him, going round the roundabout again. "Lots of time. Think slower, Sid."

They made three complete circuits before Sidney finally made his mind up, but he did at least get it right. A few minutes later, Geno was pulling the car into his driveway and parking in his usua spot. He and climbed out and locked it while Sidney wandered towards his house, the gravel in a soothing rhythm under his rolling gate.

Then crunching came to an abrupt halt. 

"Uh, Geno?" Sidney called. 

He had paused at the bottom of the steps, staring up at Geno's front door. Except his front door wasn't there; it had been replaced by a window. Geno stared. 

"дерьмо," he swore. 

Sidney turned away from his house and looked up at him curiously. 

"Is it supposed to be like that?" he asked. "Did you remodel or something?"

"No," Geno said. 

"Yeah," said Sidney. "I figured probably not."

They stood side by side on Geno's driveway for a minute, looking at it. Geno felt rather betrayed. He'd flown half-way across the world - again - to come and play hockey for Pittsburgh. He'd signed a contract in the summer that effectively committed him to the city for the rest of his career. He'd walked out of his front door _scarcely an hour ago_. And now this. 

Also, the window looked familiar, and it was bugging him. 

"Sid," he said, "I think is my kitchen window?"

"Really?" said Sid.

They glanced at each other, and, without saying anything, walked round to the back of the house. Sure enough, one of Geno's kitchen windows was missing, and in its place was the front door.   

"This is weird," said Sidney. "But at least we found your door. That's a start."

He wasn't exactly wrong; but Geno's house was built on very tall foundations, which meant that the lock and doorknob were  quite a height above even Geno's head and certainly too high to reach. So although they had found Geno's front door, they still coudn't get into the house.

He put this to Sidney, who nodded and was quiet for a minute, thinking. 

"Okay," he said, seeming to reach a conclusion. "You got your keys?"

Geno nodded.

"Right," said Sidney. "Here's what we do." 

Sidney's plan was to position himself directly underneath the door and squat down with his hands braced on the wall for balance. He got Geno to take off his shoes and climb onto his shoulders, also leaning on the wall for balance, then rose from the squat (displaying perfect form), boosting Geno up the wall. 

When Sidney was standing up straight, Geno was just able to get the key into the lock and open the door. He placed his hands flat on the kitchen floor and clambered into his house as though he was getting out of a swimming pool. The first thing he did, waving for Sidney to hang tight a minute, was to fetch one of the stools from his breakfast bar and lower it down to Sidney outside. Sidney climbed onto it and took Geno's offered arm in a good, solid, elbow-to-elbow grip, which gave him the leverage he needed to run up the wall of the house in a sort of reverse abseil and join Geno in the kitchen. 

"Nice work," he said, nodding at Geno approvingly, and they high-fived.

After that, they turned to contemplate Geno's front door, still very much where it should not have been. Geno looked at Sid, who looked at Geno, and they reached an unspoken agreement to deal with it later. 

"Okay," said Sidney. "Let's have a look at your taps."

They went over to the kitchen sink. Sidney stood with his arms folded, observing, as Geno turned first the hot tap, then the cold tap, then both together.

"See?" he said. "Not working."

"Nope," Sidney agreed; then he paused and cocked his head.

"What?" Geno asked. 

"Shh," said Sidney. He bent his ear towards the sink until his head was practically stuck under the tap. Geno stared at him, wondering at the back of his mind if whatever was making his house behave in such a peculiar way was infecting Sidney. He worried that after all the hits on the head Sidney had suffered over the years, he'd become susceptible. 

"Sid," he began cautiously, but Sidney just waved him quiet and then started opening the taps further. 

Suddenly, Geno could hear something too, and as Sidney continued to twist the taps it got louder and louder. It was the sound of a huge crowd. A familiar voice began to speak over it, saying 'Malkin. _Galloping._ Malkin, _to the goal_ , _**scooores!!**_ ', followed by the blast of the Pens' goal horn. 

Sidney straightened, looking at him excitedly. 

"Hey," he said, "that was your goal against Tampa!"

At that point, the sound of cheering was replaced by a voice saying: "you're listening to Pens Radio, brought to you by...."

"It's Pens Radio!" Sidney exclaimed, looking at Geno with wide eyes. Geno nodded slowly, staring at his sink in utter confusion. He reached out, not knowing what made him do it, and cautiously pulled the neck of the tap to rotate it. For the second the sound cut out, replaced by static, and then Geno and Sidney leapt backwards as the kitchen was filled with blaring music, bouncing off the tiled floor and making the walls rattle.

_** ROLLIN' IN, HELLA DEEP, HEADIN' TO THE MEZZANINE... ** _

Geno recovered first and hastily went to turn the taps off. The music faded, and then stopped completely. 

In the ringing silence that followed, he and Sidney found themselves staring at each other again.

"Was not doing that earlier," Geno said.

"Huh," said Sidney. "Well, I definitely think you need a plumber. At least. I'm going to call Gordo."

He pulled out his phone and wandered off to make the call.

Geno was feeling far too antsy to wait around while Sidney tried to get hold of his plumber. He still hadn't recovered from the adrenaline rush of suddenly having club-volume Macklemore pounding in his ears, so he paced around the dining table a couple of times, trying to settle, then dropped himself onto the chair in front of his laptop. He was going to go on Google and try to find out if this had ever happened to anyone else. His expectations were not high. It was more to have something to do than a constructive attempt at solving the problem. 

Unfortunately, his laptop was working no better than his taps. When he opened it, the screen lit up very brightly - much brighter than it should have done - but it was completely blank and it stayed that way. Geno closed his laptop and opened it again a couple of times, but the same thing happened. Deeply frustrated, he swore under his breath and started viciously keysmashing; that had no effect either. He gave up in disgust and threw himself back in his chair to sulk. Only then did he notice Sidney standing by his shoulder.

"I got hold of Gordo," he reported. "He said he could come over now and take a look." 

Geno nodded moodily, wondering what good a plumber was going to do when his entire house seemed to be jinxed.

Sidney was eyeing his laptop speculatively. He stepped closer and opened the lid, watching the screen light up, and repeated the process a couple of times, just as Geno had, with his brow wrinkled in thought. Geno watched him look at the kitchen sink, back at the laptop, back at the sink, and then, slowly, up at the lights in the ceiling. 

"Do you think, maybe...." he muttered, and trailed off, wandering over to the light switch by the door. Moving cautiously, he reached out a hand and pressed it. 

No lights came on; instead, Geno recognised the sound of his laptop's start-up chime. 

Sidney turned to him, grinning. 

"Got it," he said, sounding extremely pleased with himself. He opened his mouth to say something else, and then leapt about a foot in the air when the kitchen was once again filled with deafening noise. This time, it wasn't music. For a second, Geno froze completley, listening in horror to the wet, fleshy sounds of energetic sex and some badly-scripted and shockingly-delivered Russian dialogue which hadn't bothered him at all at the time, but now seemed unbearable. Then he bolted out of his seat and flew across the kitchen to the light switch, slamming it off with a flat palm.

There was a moment of ringing silence. Then Geno slumped against the wall and pressed the heels of his hands hard into his eyes, suddenly as tired and as he had been that morning.

When he could bring himself to look at Sidney, he found him staring back, eyes wide, lips quivering, and the tips of his ears turned bright red.

"Oh," he said. "Uh. Pardon me."

Then, for the second time that day, he collapsed into laughter at Geno's expense, propping himself up on the wall next to him and actually hitting it with his fist a couple of times, convulsing. Geno kept his eyes fixed stonily front-and-centre until Sidney's laughter suddenly cut out, as though someone had just jerked on his tie. He was still bright red, but now he looked scandalised.

"Were you jerking off in the _kitchen_?" he asked, fixing Geno with a look that was both accusatory and deeply judgmental.  "Geno, that's gnarly _._ Geez."

Geno let his head thump back against the wall and closed his eyes in despair. He wanted to explain, indignantly, that he had _not_ been jerking off in the kitchen, he'd been jerking off in _Russia,_ as he had every fucking right to, and had then left his laptop on the kitchen table when he arrived yesterday after his flight. But it all felt a bit beyond him. He'd had enough. 

Sidney seemed to pick up on his mood, because he patted him consolingly on the shoulder and wandered off somewhere else, giving Geno space to wallow. He sighed deeply, and let his head drop dejectly onto his chest, but was jerked out of his gloomy ruminations a moment later by a loud squawk from the other side of the kitchen. He looked over and saw Sidney wrestling with his digital radio, from which was issuing a powerful jet of water.

By the time Sidney managed to shut it off, his shirt was soaked through. He looked down at himself with an extremely sour expression on his face, and peeled the sodden material away from his chest. 

"Well," he said, flatly. "I guess that confirms it."

He stomped off upstairs to appropriate one of Geno's shirts, leaving Geno to laugh himself sick in the kitchen.

*****

When Gordo the plumber arrived, not much time later, Geno and Sidney were sitting side by side in the living room playing Candy Crush. Sidney had figured correctly that their phones must be behaving normally, or he wouldn't have been able to call Gordo in he first place.

Gordo was a stout, cheerful yinzer with an amazing old-school waxed moustache, which twitched whenever he spoke. He clapped Sidney on the shoulder and introduced himself to Geno, briskly shaking his hand.

"You boys hang tight," he said. "I'll go have a look."

It had been such a strange day that Geno barely spared a thought to wonder how he had got in.

"He'll fix it," Sidney said confidently, patting Geno's shoulder and turning straight back to his phone. "What level are have you got to?"

Gordo did fix it, in next to no time. He took them through to the kitchen and demonstrated the now fully-functional kitchen sink, chattering merrily away. Geno sneaked over to the kitchen table as Gordo was packing up his things, and opened his laptop. It booted normally, no over-bright blank screen, and he quickly closed it again, feeling very relieved. 

At that moment, all of the lights went on. Geno looked over sharply and found Sidney standing by the light switch, trying to look casual.

"They're fine too, no worries," Gordo called from by the sink.

"Oh good, that's great," said Sidney. Geno glared at him. 

Even the front door was back to normal. He knocked on it a couple of times to check as they saw Gordo out.

"Thanks Gordo," Sidney said. "Appreciate it."

"No problem, kid," Gordo smiled. "How're the showers?"

"Awesome," said Sidney, solemnly, and Geno nodded in agreement.

"Good stuff," said Gordo, sounding satisfied. He looked at Geno. "You have any more trouble, just let me know. The kid knows how to get hold of me."

They watched him as he walked down the driveway and then turned round the corner, out of sight.

"Well, that was something," Sidney said, then glanced at his watch an did a double take. "Geez, it's only lunchtime."

Geno contained an unhappy groan. To him it felt like time go back to bed. Sidney looked at him consideringly. 

"Let's go out and get food," he said, firmly. "My treat."

"Okay," Geno said, and smiled, because it was a such thoughtful, Sidney sort of thing to do. He bumped their shoulders together gently. "Thanks."

"No problem," said Sidney, and then hesitated. "Hey, if you want, you can still come and stay at mine for a while. It'd be nice to have someone else around the place. We could pick up a spare bed in town."

" _Yes_ ," Geno said, fervently. He was glad everything was fixed, but he still felt no desire to go back into his kitchen for at least a week. 

"Good," said Sidney, sounding pleased.  "You go pack a bag. I'll wait here." 

"Okay," said Geno, and headed upstairs. 

"Don't bring your laptop," Sidney called after him, sounding stern.

Geno shook his head, and laughed.

**Author's Note:**

> The idea for this story was shamelessly lifted from one of the books of The Magic Roundabout series (which the Brits among you might have heard of), featuring Geno as Dougal and Sidney as Florence, for the most part, with moments of Brian. The Magic Roundabout was also made into a number of TV episodes, which can be found on Youtube for anyone who's interested!
> 
> The goal call I used for Geno's Tampa goal was from the TV feed not the radio broadcast, because I couldn't find the radio version and I wanted to use that goal :3 If you caught that and it bothered you, I'm sorry!


End file.
